5/10
The kids were with me for Mother’s Day which was a blessing. This was also the hottest day of the year! The boys helped me finish some yardwork (regrading an area after a stump, putting down grass seed, etc.). Then Nana came over and we had a nice lunch on the patio following all the social distancing guidelines. We exchanged gifts and the kids had each made something special for me. Charlotte made an original video in my honor and gave me a cool thank you sign (wow!), Reed made a speech that he recorded on his kids’ digital camera, and Edison built me a Magic the Gathering deck of cards. We found a wonderful hanging basket for Nana and a stainless steel mug that shouts out what a great Nana she is. We went for an incredibly hot walk through the neighborhood, then relaxed on the patio in the shade before having some cake. After she returned home, the kids and I relaxed a bit, including hammock time for me, and then had a family Zoom session. The highlight was seeing my nephew Izaac walking (at 10 months!). We capped off the day with Thai food in our beautiful backyard that we’ve worked so hard at improving.
Home learning: mapped out the day’s tasks for each child. Got going with those and with zoom meetings, etc. Everyone did their work for the most part. Charlotte got really into a science project experimenting with parachutes. Reed is getting very proficient at completing work on See Saw and had his Monday class Zoom. I got to sit next to him as he showed me how he completes “letter” quizzes on Superkids. Edison was diligent and just kept moving ahead with his work all day. Both Edison and Charlotte are very deep into the Mortal Engines book series and sometimes I have to remind them to “stop reading and pay attention!” Happy that this is our biggest problem! We exercised on the neighborhood loop - all the kids did a one-mile run. After dinner we did a very short hike at Grace Cole Nature Preserve just to be out in the woods and followed that with a game of Yahtzee. It was nice to spend time together after being in our separate “home learning modes” all day.
Another day of home learning. Highlights: Reed starting Super Kids book for letter “N” and doing a few activities all by himself on See Saw. Edison getting into a poetry project as well as mastering a new kind of paper airplane for a science lesson. Charlotte wrapping up her class Zoom by playing a scavenger hunt game in which she had to wear about 20 different layers of clothing. The kids spent a few hours at Nana’s and helped her in her yard. We bought a new mountain bike for Reed since the old one he was using kept breaking constantly and only had six gears. He is really excited for this new one and I am too! The kids’ basketballs arrived and they were playing together before dinner which was the whole vision with getting the hoop. It is a small hoop, however, so if they get really into this, we’ll have to get a bigger one. Finished up the evening with taking a work Zoom call on a 3-mile walk while kids experimented with some new online learning tools from Adaptive Learning. We cuddled up to part of the second Harry Potter movie before bed. Everyone had smiles on their faces and was excited for another day coming up tomorrow!
Home learning in the morning included multiple zooms and many learning modules posted by their teachers online. I hosted my leadership class and attended my all-staff meeting. Edison made and tested a catapult. We exercised in the neighborhood. Then we had our first foray into a social distanced playdate. We went to the Birgfelds - the kids ran and ran and ran around their amazing property while Cally and I caught up about a million things, including the challenges of working from home with students while managing home learning for our own children. It was an absolute delight!
More home learning - it rained this morning - so that helped us do some deep focusing on our tasks. I’ve come to the realization that Reed needs me (or an older sibling) sitting with him while he works. He is, after all, six! So this just means that we need to build that time in together. Edison and Charlotte are very self-directed and mostly I just check in and ask how its going and help them with computer stuff if they have trouble. Charlotte engaged in a frustrating catapult experiment today, but finally got it done. We finished up learning tasks in the early afternoon and went for a nice bike ride (I ran) at Magnusson Park. Reed wanted to take his new bike on the cement walls. We splurged and got afternoon snacks at the Magnusson Cafe - wow - it was awesome! Reed didn’t love it, however, which was a bummer. We wrapped up last tasks, including some laying of a brick border in the backyard, when we got home. Then the kids had a zoom with Cascade swim coach, Pete, and their swimmer friends and also their Mortal Engines Book Club Zoom at night.
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